The silver-gilt cup presented to the Wimbledon men’s champion is inscribed
with the words “The All England Lawn Tennis Club Single Handed Championship
of the World.”

Yet if Andy Murray were to win today, the achievement would be not be single-handed, but shared by his whole team: his fitness trainers Jez Green and Matt Little, his physio Andy Ireland, and above all his hugely influential coach Ivan Lendl.

Lendl’s contribution might have been questioned during Murray’s shaky spring period, four months in which he struggled to build on the promise he had shown at the Australian Open. But over the last fortnight he has shown himself to be an insightful – and hugely detailed – analyst.

Murray explained last week that, because of the volume of expertise that Lendl was passing on about his opponents, he had started bringing their tactical meeting forward from the morning of the match to the night before.

“Someone like him, he’s very exact, he doesn’t miss anything,” Murray said. “He gives you a lot of information on players so I have started to talk the night before matches so I can process it and sleep on it. That’s really been the big difference.”

Lendl might have barely attended a tennis match between 1994 – the year of his retirement – and his first appearance in Murray’s player’s box. But his chess-player’s brain remained sharp, as Murray discovered when they met in a Florida pizza restaurant last year to discuss the possibility of working together.

Right there and then, Lendl ran through the game plans he would use if he had been the one on court against the Big Three. He virtually drew a diagram for each opponent on the back of a napkin – how you play Roger Federer, Rafael Nadal and Novak Djokovic. So last night’s tactical briefing for today's Wimbledon final should not have been too much of a surprise.

The presence of Lendl – a totally impassive figure, whether Murray is winning or losing – has also helped Murray deal with his own emotional turbulence. No more do we see him barking at his coaches, or even clutching at his back, when big points go against him.

“Is it right or wrong what Lendl is telling Murray?” Mats Wilander said yesterday, in an interview carried by thetennisspace.com. “It doesn’t really matter. It’s just an opinion.

“The most important thing is that Lendl makes Murray commit to a decision about the way he does things. If someone can convince you to commit to Plan A and not Plan B, that’s the person that you need.”